6. Papo & Yo

Indie puzzler Papo & Yo is a video game through and through: It has climbable ladders, autosaving, platforms you tap a gamepad to jump between and literal geometry-bending conundrums whose solutions enable passage from one area to another. And yet it’s also a playable metaphor for something much darker: the tortured relationship between an abusive father and his terrified son. But instead of melodrama, the game preaches reverie. Instead of nightmarish scenery, you’re treated to dilapidated yet beautifully sunlit favela-scapes that groove with soothing, trance-like tunes. This is big idea-gaming at its finest, testing your brain with clever twisters, but also your emotions as you attempt to cure a bumbling monster of his sinister vice.